In plain words
In the principle of this Puruhūta we must also recognise its inner meaning, at least in part. In waking, dream and deep sleep, now and then we forget even Manas for a while. When this Manas is agitated, we have to invoke Indra now and then to restrain it. So every human being, too, keeps invoking this Indra every day, at least a few times.
As for the duty of the nature of Manas, it is to experience the senses without ceasing! Only when one tries to restrain this does it gain its sacred, fitting name, Indratva. So control of the senses is the chief yajña. To make them roam as we please is not the duty of the senses. Making the senses move along the right path, from the level of the mind, we must set about the effort to rise to Indratva. This nature of Manas, stirred in many ways by anger and vexation, keeps forgetting its humanness. To lay such evil qualities on the altar called Manas and offer them up in self-surrender, they took up a path called control of the senses. What we must do is place evil qualities, evil thoughts, evil company and wickedness on the sacrificial altar of this yajña, and offer them up. Whenever we place these animal qualities on this altar of yajña and offer them to God as oblation, that is the true form of yajña.
So today is the day of offering up these beastly natures, these animal qualities, bringing it to completion, and experiencing fullness in the principle of Manas. Just as a seed placed in the soil comes up as a sapling, grows into a tree and fills with splendid fruit and flowers, so man is born. He grows; he matures. He must become complete. So man too is just like a tree born of the soil. To look at this lump of clay and take it for the man is the great Ajñāna; to look at this clay pot and take it for Consciousness is the second mark of Ajñāna. That is why, to make this body worthwhile, we must make the effort to seek the indweller. From this day on, we must make the effort to root out the animal qualities, the animal feelings within us. Only when we set our hands to an effort like this will we gain, for having performed yajñas, yāgas and such rites, or for having watched them, some fruit. However long it may be, however many years go by, we must not waste our time in a kind of tāmasic sloth, our sādhanas not stepping forward, staying just where they are. Step by step, turning our vision inward and keeping outward vision down to some extent, we must set about following the right path, at least a little.
Even in Prasanthi Nilayam I am trying, step by step, to reduce outward rituals, so as to develop sādhanas of this kind and to have people follow a life that is, to some extent, exemplary. Though we do pūjās, bhajans, japa and tapas, keeping our vision fixed on the citta, with pure feeling we must, step by step, keep reducing these outward habits to some extent.